The Home of Australian Craft Beer

Feature Beer Awards: The Royal Adelaide Beer Show

Sun Jul 8 2012 by Crafty Pint

For the second year running, microbreweries dominated the trophies at the Royal Adelaide Beer Show. There was a changing of the guard, however, with McLaren Vale based craft brewery Goodieson (pictured above) the star of the show, picking up a swag of gongs as Lobethal Bierhaus had done in 2011. Other winners included Feral), whose Hop Hog did its usual trick of rocking up, winning Champion Ale, then heading off to quench the thirst of more Aussies, and Nail Brewing. The latter’s Clout Stout added to its own collection of top awards with the Champion Stout title. The awards are good timing for the WA duo, with Feral and Nail having recently moved into a brand new 5,000 litre brewery from which they will start distributing widely across Australia from August.

Goodieson, which is run by husband and wife team Jeff and Mary Goodieson, was named Champion South Australian Brewery, Champion Small Brewery and took out Champion Exhibit and Champion Wheat Beer for its Wheat Beer. Victoriaâs Tooborac Hotel & Brewery won the Champion Porter title for its Blacksmiths Porter, while Champion Reduced Alcohol Beer, Champion Lager and Champion Large
Brewery were won by the pride of SA, Coopers.

This was the second year for the awards run by the Royal Agricultural & Horticultural Society, with 90 entries judged over two days. This year also saw the introduction of a Media Choice award chosen by an all-female panel drawn from SA’s TV, print and radio media. The winner was Clout Stout, a beer that is only brewed once a year. Just 600 numbered 750ml bottles have been packaged, with the first released in Perth last week and the remainder making their way across Australia from this week. First brewed to celebrate Nail Brewing turning 10 in 2010, it is a 10.7 per cent Russian Imperial Stout, the big brother to Nail Stout, itself a serial award winner.

The Crafty Pint is an independent online magazine and resource for anyone interested in craft beer in Australia. We bring an honest, old-fashioned journalistic approach to beer's brave new world, telling stories because they're worth telling not because someone is paying us to write them.

Like many of the people who have changed the face of beer in Australia, we believe in authenticity, integrity, enjoyment and love. We hope to play a role in helping good beer, brewed by good people, find its way into the hands of more drinkers.